AMC Theatres Swings to Quarterly Profit Without ‘Barbie’
August 8, 2023
AMC Entertainment Aug. 8 said it posted net income of $8.6 million in the second quarter (ended June 30), compared with a net loss of $121.6 million in the previous-year period. Revenue increased 15.6% to $1.35 billion, from $1.17 billion in the prior-year period, the highest quarter in four years.
The world’s largest theater operator attributed the increase to a 12% growth in attendance and a 15% growth in total revenue compared with the second quarter of 2022. AMC theaters across the globe generated more than 66 million paying customers in the quarter, the highest quarterly attendance number since the fourth quarter of 2019.
And this was before the July releases of Barbie, Oppenheimer, Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One and Sound of Freedom. The month of July was AMC’s largest revenue month in the chain’s 103-year history.
“With the first half of the year now behind us, the 2023 domestic industry box office is 20% ahead of last year, and we believe the second half of the year could be even better unless the current writers/actors strikes wind
up delaying the release of movie titles into next year,” CEO Adam Aron said in a statement.
More importantly, Aron contends that despite the chain’s $643 million in liquidity at the end of the quarter, the exhibitor’s ability to raise capital going forward remains critical to its survival. AMC ended the quarter with a $62 million negative cash flow, meaning it spent more operating its business than it took in.
“There are real and potentially severe liquidity hurdles on the horizon that we will need to overcome,” Aron said.
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